1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates generally to the field of data extraction. More particularly, the invention relates to the extraction of data relevant to an interest of a user. The user interest is determined based on the actions of the user.
2. Description of the Related Art
The Internet and the World Wide Web have spawned an information revolution providing people with a single point of access to data and information on a wide variety of topics that previously required a person to consult with number of sources that were often located in multiple places. For example, a person desiring to purchase a camera today need only access the Web from his computer to gather information about the different cameras available, read reviews about the one or more cameras that meet his needs, locate vendors who carry the chosen camera, perform a price comparison among the vendors, and finally, purchase the camera. The entire process can be accomplished by a person without ever leaving his home and the camera will typically arrive within one to three days via the post office or some other package delivery service. In contrast, prior to the Web, a person would have to research the available camera choices by contacting camera stores located within his geographic region, more often than not traveling to various stores to view the various cameras and to gather literature. He might go to the library to consult photography magazines to read professional reviews. He might consult with his friends and colleges to see what camera they use. Next, he would visit or call the various vendors to find the one offering the best price, then travel to the chosen vendor to purchase the camera. In the end, the process would have taken several days, if not weeks, required a significant amount of the person's time, and cost the person money in terms of travel expenses.
Despite the above stated advantages offered by the availability of an enormous amount of online information, accessing the information still requires a relatively high degree of skill and luck on the part of the user. The user needs to know what web sites to go to locate certain types of information. Often a user will utilize a search engine (such as Lycos, or Alta Vista) or a web content listing service (such as Yahoo) to find information about a particular topic, but the quality of information retrieved by these types of services often depends on the service chosen and the quality of the search query. Once results are returned the user often has to shift through the results web page by web page to find one or more that have the desired information. The search process may need to be repeated multiple times for a given search area depending on the particular aspect of a topic that the user desires information about. For instance, with regard to the camera example, the person might run a search to first determine the cameras that are available and their specifications. Next, he might perform a search to find reviews of the one or more of the cameras to find out what owners and professional experts think of the product. Finally, he might do a search to find the online retailer that is selling the camera for the lowest price. Although the time taken to complete the research and make a purchase may be significantly shorter than the time involved using the traditional methodology described above, a significant amount of time may be required nonetheless, a large portion of the time being searching sources that have information relevant to the user and identifying relevant information.